How to Automate a Faceless Shorts Channel With Claude Code and the AutoShort MCP

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We build AutoShort with Claude Code every day, so it was natural to let Claude drive the product too. AutoShort runs a remote MCP server: once it is connected, Claude can list niches, draft a script with you scene by scene, render the video and check its status, all from the terminal. This guide is the exact workflow, including the parts that still need a human.

What you will build

By the end you will have a repeatable loop: you give Claude a channel idea, it proposes a week of topics, you approve or rewrite them, and it renders each one as a vertical, narrated, captioned Short. Nothing posts until you decide it should. The loop takes a few minutes of your attention per video instead of an hour of editing, and the attention goes where it matters: the idea and the first line.

Before you start

• Claude Code. It needs a paid Claude plan. If you have not tried it, our Claude guest pass (referral link: 7-day guest pass; we may receive usage credit) gives you 7 days of Pro, which includes Claude Code. It asks for a card and renews unless you cancel, and passes are limited, so it may already be gone.
• An AutoShort account with credits. Every paid plan starts with a 3-day free trial; a standard video costs 40 credits.
• An API key. Create one in the dashboard under API keys. It starts with sk_live_. Treat it like a password: never paste it into a chat, a repo or a screenshot.

Step 1: Connect Claude Code

AutoShort's MCP server is remote (Streamable HTTP), so there is nothing to install. One command registers it, with your key as a Bearer header:

claude mcp add --transport http autoshort https://autoshort.org/api/mcp \
  --header "Authorization: Bearer sk_live_your_key_here"

Start a new Claude Code session and run /mcp. You should see autoshort listed as connected. Then ask Claude something cheap to prove it works: “What is my AutoShort credit balance?” It will call autoshort_get_credit_balance, which is free. If you get an authentication error, the key is wrong or revoked; create a new one rather than debugging the old one.

A tip from running this for a while: put the channel's rules in a short CLAUDE.md in the folder you work from (audience, tone, banned topics, target length). Claude reads it every session, so you stop repeating yourself.

Step 2: Plan the week with Claude

Ask Claude to call autoshort_get_capabilities and autoshort_list_niches first. Both are free, and they tell it which niches, art styles and durations are valid, so it does not invent options the API will refuse.

Then give it the brief. Ours looks like this:

Channel: everyday psychology for busy people.
Plan 7 Shorts, 30 seconds each. For each: a one-line hook,
the core idea, and why someone would rewatch it.
No medical claims. No "you won't believe" hooks.

Claude will come back with seven ideas. This is the step people skip and should not: throw out the weak ones and rewrite hooks in your own words. A model is good at volume and structure, and average at the first three seconds, which is the part that decides whether anyone keeps watching.

Step 3: Draft, review, render

There are two ways to make each video, and they suit different moods:

• One shot: autoshort_generate_video with a topic, optional niche, duration (15, 30, 60 or 90 seconds) and artStyle. AutoShort writes the script itself. Fast, less control.
• Draft first: autoshort_draft_video takes the scenes you and Claude agreed on, narration and visual for each. autoshort_get_draft shows timing estimates, the credit estimate and warnings (for example, a scene with too many words for its length). Fix it with autoshort_update_draft, then autoshort_render_draft. Reading and editing a draft is free; credits are charged when you render.

We use the draft path for anything we care about. The warnings catch the most common problem in AI scripts, which is simply too many words: a 30-second Short holds roughly 70 to 80 spoken words, and models love to write 120.

Voice is a setting, not a separate tool. Natural Google Cloud voices are included. If you want an ElevenLabs voice, AutoShort charges 25 extra credits per video for it; you do not need your own ElevenLabs account for that. Our own data on which voice viewers rated higher is in the voice comparison, and the answer surprised us.

Step 4: Check and publish

Rendering is asynchronous. Claude polls autoshort_get_video every 20 to 30 seconds until the status is COMPLETED (with a playable video URL) or FAILED. If a render fails you are refunded under the normal rules, and the error message says why; ask Claude to read it to you rather than retrying blindly.

Watch every video before it goes out. Look for three things: a hook that lands in the first two seconds, scenes that show what the narration is saying at that moment, and captions that are readable on a phone. If one scene is off, revise that scene instead of re-rendering the whole video.

For publishing, connect your YouTube channel in AutoShort and let it post, or download the file and upload it yourself. TikTok videos go to your TikTok drafts so you publish them with one tap. If you would rather not run Claude every day, set the channel up as a Series inside AutoShort and it will generate on a schedule; Claude is then only needed for planning.

What it costs

Real numbers from our own pricing, so you can budget before you start:

• Listing niches, capabilities, drafts, video status and your balance: free.
• A standard Short: 40 credits. With an ElevenLabs voice: 65.
• The Starter plan is $19 a month for 1,200 credits, about 30 standard videos.
• Claude Code itself is billed by Anthropic on your Claude plan. The MCP calls are small; the long conversations about ideas are what use your Claude limits.

What this does not do

It does not make a channel grow. Automation removes the editing; it does nothing for an idea nobody wants to watch. Our own experiments are the proof: on our founder channel, the 47 to 62 second talking-style scripts sat at 0 to 22 views for weeks on this pipeline, while tighter 28-second Shorts with a visual hook got roughly 150 to 230 views each. It is a small sample from one channel, not a rule, but the direction was clear. What moved the numbers was the format and the hook, not posting more. Treat the loop as a way to test more ideas per week, then double down on the ones viewers actually finish.

It also does not replace your judgment on what is true. If a Short states a fact, check it before it goes out. Claude is fast; it is not a fact checker for your channel.

If you want to try the workflow, start an AutoShort trial, create an API key and run the connect command above. The first useful thing to ask Claude is not “make me a video” but “plan seven, and tell me which one you would cut”.